Reversible reaction and diffusion within a porous catalyst slab

This study elucidates how integration of reaction and separation can bring about enhancement of effectiveness factors via consideration of a catalyst immobolized onto a porous slab-shaped bead which catalyzes a reversible reaction where the reactant and the product possess different apparent diffusivities. The porous support is assumed to play the dual role of avoiding loss of the catalyst in the reactor/separator effluent stream and bring about in situ separation of reactant and product. In order to simplify the model situation and allow analytical reasoning to be followed throughout, only reversible first-order kinetics in an ideal binary system are considered.